Published on : 20/07/2022 – 11:20Modified : 20/07/2022 – 11:19
Eugene (United States) (AFP) – Without much international reference, the 400m hurdles runner Wilfried Happio (23) narrowly failed to win a first medal for the Blues on Tuesday at the Worlds in Eugene (Oregon) following a dazzling progression and a few hectic weeks of a non-sporting point of view.
In athletics everything goes very quickly, and not only Wilfried Happio. On June 25, this hope of tricolor athletics received a violent punch in the face on the stadium of a Caen high school a few minutes from a victory at the French Championships with only one eye open.
Twenty-four days later, he cut 1 sec 70 from his record (a madness at this level) and almost reached the podium of one of the greatest competitions in the world.
In a boiling Hayward field, Happio (47 sec 41) glimpsed the bronze following a superb race, before seeing the American Trevor Bassitt (47 sec 39), pushed by the crowd, remount it in the last straight line and the pass on the line, the beauty and the cruelty of athletics united in an instant.
“For the moment it’s a disappointment, to stay at the foot of the podium. But I feel that I’m turning a corner. I knew I had to start strong, I felt good, fast. The last hurdles were more complicated, at the end I miss it a bit. The American may have left more slowly, congratulations to him, but it’s the last time he does this to me!”, reacted the Frenchman in the mixed zone, his eyes misty .
“A mental click”
A year following a legendary race at the Tokyo Olympics, the 400m hurdles offered a new madness. In front, the Brazilian Alison dos Santos won in 46 sec 29, a crazy time, the 3rd of all time behind the Olympic times of the Norwegian Karsten Warholm (45.94, world record) and the American Rai Benjamin (46.17).
On Tuesday, Benjamin once more took silver (46.89), while Warholm collapsed following a furious start to the race (7th in 48 sec 52). The reigning double world champion ended up paying for his injury suffered in early June which had seen him land in the United States without reference.
And there, ready, Wilfried Happio was familiar with these monsters of sport, who outdated for good the old world record of the American Kevin Young (46.78) which had held from 1992 to 2021.
Junior European champion in 2017 then hopeful in 2019, Happio has just beaten his personal best three times in four races, the combination of a long work and the contribution of his sponsor’s new shoes, which arrived at the end of June, in the range of “magic” shoes that have been contributing to the performance boom on the track for three years.
“It seems + phew +, but it’s been three years that I stagnated in 49 seconds while I was training hard. Above all, there was a click to be had, mental. When you are very young and doubts arise, you stumble, you sets limits for himself. Today I didn’t set any, that’s what it looks like.”
He even came within just four hundredths of Stéphane Diagana’s French record (47.37). Consultant for France Television on the competition, the former European record holder (until 2019) has given some paid advice to Happio and his coach Olivier Vallaeys in recent days.
Complaint for sexual assault
On his little sporting cloud, Happio has had some hectic weeks off the track.
On June 30, a French international athlete filed a complaint once morest him for sexual assault. The complainant denounces repeated touching which allegedly took place at Insep, where the two athletes train, on the night of September 20, 2021.
The young woman is the sister of the man who hit Happio in the face in Caen, leaving him with a small scar that followed him to the other side of the world in Oregon.
Insep has opened an internal investigation. The French Athletics Federation (FFA), which selected the athlete for the Worlds, decided not to seize its own disciplinary committee.
“I don’t think we have to substitute for justice and we are not in absolute urgency,” said national technical director Patrick Ranvier.
© 2022 AFP
